Squats vs Leg Press

Even though the leg press machine can be used with good effect, some people just take it too far.

This is the most hated guy in the gym right now. Of course we aren’t going to take the time to body shame him because that’s not nice even though we do notice that it wouldn’t be impossible for him to take in many simple carbs and alcohol.

It happened at my gym.

I rolled in around 8AM to the local squat rack, ya see. First, I hit the cables for a little bit to get the joints and movements warmed up and I noticed that the usually strong squatters are not squatting much weight at all today. Some of them definitely squat more than I do.

I was working upper body anyway that day.

So I went to one of the open racks and began some warm up sets for the barbell press. My goal was to hit some rounds with the 135lbs so I needed two 45s. I only had one available. Then, I looked at the other guys trying to squat near me and said something to which we all agreed was unfortunate that one guy had stolen all of the 45 pound plates nearby for his Leg Press machine partial range of motion circuit training.

To make it worse, he was circuit training on other machines for the upper body and also using more 45 lb plates. Next time I see something like that, I’m going to engage that person because I am seriously curious as to what the mindset or thought process was.

Here is your answer: Squats are far more efficient for the amount of weight used.

Let’s put it this way: 45 lb plates are a limited resource in this busy city neighborhood gym. One guy took almost all of the plates in the weightlifting area for his 45 degree sled.

Think back to junior high for a second and realize that the math is simple. You need far less force to move an object on a machine fixed path forward and upward compared to the stability demands of a loaded barbell completely on top of you.

Reason why Leg Press is inefficient for the amount of weight used

The squat utilizes those 45 plates more economically for the lifters that less 45 plates actually need to be used. This means more 45 plates will be available for everybody else.

If you can’t squat, Learn to Squat.

It’s that simple. Yes, squatting is completely necessary. Even if you have bad knees, you should practice some healthy range of motion in pretty much any squat variation of your choosing. Of course barbell squats are more advanced, so starting with a dumbbell in the goblet position as a novice lifter could help you get mad gains.

Cue CrossFit opens new CrossFit location by Century Link field in Seattle.

If you live or work in Pioneer Square, near Sodo, or the International District in Seattle, you now have a new option for high intensity workouts. Cue CrossFit just opened and of course Dre Fitness had to be there since we just love events that are fitness related.

Cue CrossFit Seattle Grand Opening which is by CenturyLink field.

You can meet a lot of good people and strengthen friendships with existing people.

I love going to fitness events because I get to hang out — doing healthy activities — with friends, professional contacts, and with people I’ve never met before.

Fitness is about community.

When it comes down to it, as long as the workout is high enough intensity and safe, it really doesn’t matter what style of workout it is. Ultimately, group fitness gyms like CrossFit, Orangetheory, or growing gyms like Accelerate Seattle are all about community. We workout together, sweat together, and through the process, we become stronger together.

You can come up with new exercises or new ways to program an exercise, but ultimately if you’re not squatting, you’re just not allotting your time well. All good fitness programs will prescribe squats for you. All good fitness programs will work your muscles with exercises that promote strength and muscular balance. All good fitness programs will be prescribed by legitimate, motivational coaches.

Building community in Seattle.

People often ask me if I will ever make the leap to be the owner of my own gym. While I respect those who take the risk to open their own gyms, at this point I am going for the blogger, vlogger, and influencer route. I realize that there is only one of me and that I can produce content that is useful to many people as long as I stay dedicated and authentic to myself and my followers.

I teased Brandon S. during the video only because I have great respect for his work!

Fitness is about more than a brand name.

Even though competition can be ruthless in the fitness industry, it is still an industry that is highly rewarding. I have more and more friends who are passionate about fitness but are stuck in office jobs that they simply have no love for. For that reason, I feel blessed to be part of a fitness lifestyle in which I can fully support myself here in Seattle and Capitol Hill to be specific.

Fitness is love, need I say more?

Train hard, and use nutrition to recover your body.

Regardless of the workout, it’s all about nutrition and sleep in order to promote recovery. Excuse my language, but any jackass can go and do a hard workout. However, the person who eats wild Alaskan salmon with kale and avocado will have FARRRR superior results than the person who goes and drinks their gains away with alcohol and Dick’s burgers. It’s been my experience that people who eat Dick’s end up smelling like Dick’s too.

Thanks for reading. Even though we’re in the early process of launching our YouTube, I guarantee we will have growth. I have too much passion for the fitness and too many friends who are willing to help out that it will be impossible to fail. All we have to do is stay consistent and get the message out there.

It’s all about who you know, anyway.

How can I give you value? Reach out to me for inquiries, comments, or suggestions. Once again, thank you so much for reading!

If I’m not training full body (which I am a fan of actually), then I’m training upper/lower splits.

Even though in bodybuilding, many people will train chest on one day, back on one day, legs on one day, arms on one day, and shoulders and abs on one day, I’ve never found that style to be effective for me. I like to train the basic upper body exercises on the same day.

Dumbell Row

Upper/Lower split is like this:

Monday: Lower body

Tuesday: Upper body

Wednesday: Rest day

Thursday: Lower Body

Friday: Upper body

Sat/Sunday: Rest days or other workouts, yoga, exercise classes, various activities, outings, etc.

Full Body workout would be like this:

3-5x per week with various daily emphasis and listening to your body for recovery purposes. If you are doing Orangetheory Fitness, then it’s possible you’re already doing this. That being said, if you’re serious about gaining more strength, you’ll want to do dedicated strength training sessions and not just cardio/weights combination every time.

I mostly believe in either Full Body training and in Upper / Lower training.

If you read the muscle magazines, you really need to understand that mainstream bodybuilding magazines are full of men and women on steroids and/or performance enhancers. The reason is because illegal steroids are easy to order online and widely accessible to anybody who’s willing to do a little research. Also, they work really well and have a lot of side effects.

What those people put into their bodies is none of my business, but it creates false perceptions when it comes to the, “what,” “how,” and, “when” can I see those results for myself. Most fitness magazine cover models have bodies that are simply unattainable for people who are unwilling to risk their health by taking steroids.

Benefits of full body training and upper/lower splits: Frequency

You really shouldn’t be so concerned about shredding/destroying your muscles during an excessively long weight training session full of drop sets and exercises to failure. Instead, train for frequency and continually get stronger in key exercises such as squats, deadlift variations, bench press, rows, weighted pull ups, dips, overhead press, arm curls/extensions, and leg curls.

All you have to really do is practice on the key exercises and make progress. Most people can recover the muscles sufficiently within 48 hours as long as you didn’t burn yourself out or always going for 1 rep maxes or always going to failure.

Just imagine if you trained your bench press 2-3x/week, your db row 2-3x/week, squats and leg curls 2-3x/week! You’d make progress way faster than just doing it once per week along with a bunch of isolation exercises.

Train like an athlete and follow prominent personal trainers that train athletes.

Of course my demographic is not bodybuilding on this blog even though some people will have an interest in bodybuilding. Let me tell you, I am also interested in bodybuilding and I follow it sometimes, but I am not interested in being a bodybuilder. Fitness is my game. There’s no shame in that.

Standing overhead press is more athletic than seated overhead press and yields more benefits for fitness.

Athletes are probably the fittest people on the planet and most of them are required to take some sort of drug tests. I’d suggest to look into how athletes train — be goal oriented and don’t spread yourself too thin in your training.

Keep it simple stupid: KISS was the mantra of a personal trainer I worked with.

For my upper body workout, I’ll usually spend a couple months prioritizing about 3-4 exercises that I would typically do first in a training session. For example, on lower body, I have recently prioritized rear-foot elevated split squats and I went from doing 135lbsx8 reps per leg to doing 205lbsx6 reps per leg — the glute growth was noticeable and my running strength improved.

No need to be fancy, just set a goal on a few exercises at any given point and prioritize them. All of the other exercises are just to support the goal of increasing strength in the ones that you are prioritizing (or to promote injury prevention).

Weight training is a lifestyle.

I can program an exercise routine for you that is top notch, guaranteed to be effective. However, if you constantly go to bed late, drink alcohol often, and neglect your nutrient intake, then you’ll never make it past the “newbie gains.”

It’s not a damn secret — vegetables are the best for you.

I love strength training with weights because of the sense of accomplishment and because I know that there is literally no way I am going to make progress in the weight room if I don’t take care of my nutrition and sleep. The weight room teaches me lessons about myself and encourages me to take care of my body.

Having some muscles doesn’t hurt either.

I feel confident from my experiences, not so much from my body. But I can tell you that if I didn’t didn’t take care of myself, then those experiences I’ve had over the years wouldn’t have been as rewarding or opened nearly as many doors.

The Dumbbell Row is by far one of the best upper body exercises period.

“If you wanna grow, you gotta row.”

The dumbbell row exercise will help strengthen the muscles of the upper back, lats, rear deltoids, forearms, biceps, and even the core. For an upper body exercise, the dumbbell row has almost countless benefits for nearly all strength, athletic, and fitness goals.

I would be remiss if I didn’t mention the aesthetic benefits of having toned back muscles. Both men and women have an improved appearance (and signals of ability) by strengthening the muscles that are targeted by the DB Row.

“Some engaged lats”

For men, waist to shoulder ratio is an obvious sign of attractiveness. And for women, the DB Row can strengthen the lats and upper back and give the waist a slimming appearance due to having improved muscular proportion.

Benefit 2: Dumbbell Rows are a unilateral exercise and can remedy strength and muscular imbalances between either side of the body.

Everybody has some asymmetry so it is an important part of a good strength training program to balance strength between all planes of the body. By working one side at a time, you are guaranteed to know how much that particular side can lift, without ever wondering if your body is compensating.

Benefit of TRX Hip Bridge 1: Glute and Posterior chain activation.

Anybody who has allowed me to be their trainer and instructor knows that I am pretty much obsessed with glute activation. Even people with a big butt might have poor glute activation due to lifestyle (sitting down often, running form that is not ideal, or training programs that aren’t optimal).

Glute activation is more about strengthening or awakening the neurological connections between the brain and the butt so that you can perform efficiently and reduce incidence of faulty movement patterns.

Squeeze the butt for best results

MOREOVER, glute activation is important for the health of your lower back and other joints. Glutes need to be able to do their job and if you can’t activate the glutes, you could put yourself into poor posture (excessive anterior pelvic tilt) which will lead to injury at some point.

Benefit of TRX Hip Bridge 2: Injury prevention of hamstrings and other parts of your body.

First of all, many people are quad dominant. This means that the quadriceps are way stronger than the hamstrings and that is certainly a muscular imbalance. Research on soccer players indicates significantly higher risk of ACL and knee injury when the athlete has a poor quad to hamstring strength ratio.

The reason why the hip bridge specifically promotes healthy hamstrings is that you are performing a hamstring strengthening exercise involving your own body weight instead of using machines. While hamstring strengthening machines can be beneficial to the athlete or general population, it is valuable to balance out the training with bodyweight exercises because let’s face it: You must be able to handle your own body if you want the best in injury prevention.

Bending the knees significantly increases hamstring load and tension

The final reason that I’ll add today is that the TRX hip bridge can strengthen the hamstring with body weight at the knee joint. Because the hamstring connects at both the hip and the knee, it has function at both of those joints. While the single leg romanian deadlift can strengthen the hamstring while hinging at the hip, it is the TRX Hip Bridge or TRX Hamstring Curl that will strengthen the hamstring at the knee joint. Again, it’s all about muscular balance.

Benefit of TRX Hip Bridge 3: Carryover to other exercises.

While the TRX Hip Bridge isn’t one of those exercises that is 100% needed in every training program (in contrast to the squat, let’s say), you’ll still be able to get carryover benefit to other exercises.

You gotta stay healthy so that you can keep training

The Hip Bridge could improve your running, your deadlift, and pretty much all other related lower body activities. Due to the possible injury prevention benefits as well, it will allow you to train harder at a high intensity and therefore reach your goals even faster.

Even people with a big butt might have poor glute activation due to lifestyle.

Thanks for reading and stay tuned…

Exciting things for our blog and community are right around the corner.